PARLIAMENTARY DEBATES 505
tribes. The Hon. Minister should thus have tried to get them a seat. Since I know that this is extremely difficult I would make another suggestion. There is a general principle that as far as possible the seats for those areas which have a larger percentage of the scheduled castes, should be doubled. There are also some other considerations attached. I know that in the case of not one but several states, occasions have arisen when the Committees have not followed these rules. I do not mean to say that they have not followed them at all. Exceptions are always there and it would be right to a great extent, to treat this as an exceptional case. The reason for this is that there is a considerable difference between the people living in the rural and the urban areas of Delhi. Besides if people belonging to the scheduled castes are given representation from the rural areas they will have to experience a lot of difficulty. If any two seats out of the seats for Delhi city are doubled this would help those poor folks in whom we all are interested to secure true and proper representation. If, however, their seat is joined on to the rural seat this would not serve as a reward to them but rather as a punishment. Hence, I would appeal to the Hon. Minister to give a direction to the Election Commission that in the matter of the doubling of seats they might combine any two out of the three seats for Delhi city and turn them into double seats but that the seat for the rural areas should be left single so that it could be possible to do justice to a backward class of people who are as much entitled to sympathy as the scheduled castes.
( Translation concluded )
Shri J. R. Kapoor: Sir,….
Mr. Chairman : The Bill has been so much discussed and at such great length that I do not think any long speeches are necessary now.
Shri J. R. Kapoor: I do not want to enter into any detailed discussion. If you will permit me, Sir, I only want to utter a note of warning. I will not take more than two minutes. That note of warning is that by not accepting my contention the Hon. Law Minister has rendered the greatest possible disservice to the scheduled castes and scheduled tribes of Part C States.